HEDGE1'S PROFILE

Thanks for the suggestion Kaempfer. I ended up grabbing filament-engine.com rather than use "the" at the beginning. I went to a session on websites and they said it was preferable to use a hyphen and keep it short than remove one and make it longer. Hopefully they're right. My chief concern is that people can find it just by thinking about it, and it's a bit hard to predict how people will adjust the search when the obvious choice brings up an empty website.

(And before people check out filament-engine.com, there's nothing there yet, and there might not be for some time as hosting content is quite a bit more expensive than buying a domain.)

Can you provide more information, such as a screen shot of the monster group you're trying to test battle, and then the test battle screen itself? I am trying to replicate your error and no matter what settings I change, including removing access to all terrains and even removing all monsters in the monster group, I can't get those options to grey out.

author=kentona
kentona.rocks is available, jus' sayin'

Huh. I didn't expect .rocks to be a valid extension.

author=Large
lightbulbengine dot com is available, but sadly, for readability lightbulb-engine dot com is not.

You could also do philamentengine...

Actually, the hyphen would work with my original name, so I think I'll do that unless someone comes up with something better.

If you have an image that has fewer than 256 colors in it (it can be in a full color format, but using fewer on the screen) you can use this program to easily convert it to something readable by RPG Maker:

https://rpgmaker.net/engines/other/utilities/184/

Also, Paint is pretty terrible for conversions. GIMP certainly works, but I've found it to be a pretty extensive program for just that purpose. Instead, I prefer Ulead Gif Animator. Just drop the image in there, copy it, and then paste it elsewhere (such as iDraw) and save it.

Competition Results:

I want to thank everyone who commented and took the survey. It was very helpful in convincing the judges there was a market for my product. Unfortunately, the small return on investment was too much to overcome, and I failed to win money in the competition.

Moving Forward:

On the plus side, I made some good connections during the contest and may have other avenues for funding (though in smaller amounts). I also got connected to a group that helps startups, and will have a few opportunities to present to them for formal membership. If successful, I'll gain access to longer term coaching to help me further iron out issues that come with starting any commercial project, along with general startup resources (such as legal and marketing advice). It's a free service for those who make it, so I'm hopeful.

Related, I have one more request for all of you. I want a better name for my product. I used Filament Engine during the competition (since light bulbs are often used for ideas, and the goal of the project is to allow users to bring their ideas to life), and have used RPG Professional as my head-cannon title (since the idea is to allow users to design games that represent themselves and aren't just another "RPG Maker" game). Ideally, "RPG" would not be in the name so that I could expand it to other genres (such as Zelda clones). Does anyone have any clever name ideas? (And if you think of something months from now and don't want to find or bump this thread, go ahead and just PM me).